UXDI Project 1: Music Buddy

Music buddy can help you find music when you’re feeling like a boss

For my first week in General Assembly, I was assigned to make a media player application. I decided to focus more on a music app since everybody loves music. At first I thought this app was going to be an easy target but as I got more into it, I started to realize that many people had something about their current music app that they did not like.

Problem Assumptions

Before I jumped into all the research, I had some predictions of what problems the users might have their current music app:

Unorganized Playlists, not able to share songs, cluttered user interface, and of course the horrible and annoying ads.

Research

As part of my research I interviewed 5 people. All of them were currently using a music app. This made it much easier for me to ask the important and open ended questions.

My questions:

What music app do you use on a regular basis and why do you choose this one over any other ones?

Describe your favorite feature from this music app?

If there was one thing you would change from this app, what would it be and why?

Is there something you would improve about the app?

What are the features you do not use at all from this app?

How often do you use the app and where are the places that you use it the most?

“I hate when my music app shares to other people what I am listening to at that exact moment”

Research Findings

After all that research, I found out that most of my predictions were wrong, All of my predictions were based on my current problems and to be a great UX designer, you have to worry about the users problems and frustrations not yours. So what I found out after my interviews was the following:

People hate when they can’t use their music app offline

A lot of people like music suggestions

users like to find new songs and artists

A lot of people use mood playlists

Some people like to share music, some don’t

A lot of people hate when the app shows to

other people what you’re listening to at that moment.

The REAL problem

So after all the interviews and synthesizing, it was easy to find the real problem, which was:

It is difficult to find new music based on one’s taste and current mood and also be able to listen to it offline.

First Prototype

I really focused on the real problem and came up with my first prototype. It was just to see if the ideas that were in my head and I sketched were really going to work.

User Testing

It was time to show “Music Buddy” to the world!! (Well to my classmates lol) I started getting some positive feedback from all the testing, They were a couple people who thought it was pretty simple to use and actually a fun experience. People loved the fact that you were able to pick a mood based on an emoji, which made it so much fun to use.

Testing Findings

A lot of people didn’t like the extra step of tapping their favorite genre and then tapping on next.

They really liked the Offline Mixtape feature.

Final Prototype

After looking over all my testing findings, I decided to iterate and work on the problems people had with my app and keep the good features that people really loved. After a good number of iterations I came up with my final prototype:

Final Thoughts

This first project was a great opportunity for the class to get to know each other more and put in practice the research methods we recently learned. Can’t wait till we get more into other UX concepts and sketch.